How we respond
Save the Children responds quickly in an emergency to save lives and help families cope after a disaster. There are four steps that are usually part of a large-scale emergency response:
Step 1: Preparation and training
Step 2: Immediate help
Step 3: Full-scale relief effort
Step 4: Helping children and families rebuild their lives
Preparation and training
Save the Children UK is part of the International Save the Children Alliance, a group of organisations that work in more than 100 countries around the world. This means that we often have staff working in countries where disasters might take place. We train staff in those countries so that they can respond quickly and efficiently in the event of an emergency.
Save the Children also works with communities to help them prepare for a disaster so that they can respond in the best way to avoid a loss of life.
Immediate help
Natural disasters, like floods and tsunamis, often happen within seconds. But those disasters can kill thousands and leave hundreds of thousands more at risk of perishing if they don't receive help. Conflicts can force people to flee their homes leaving only with what they can carry on their backs.
When an emergency strikes, our teams on the ground and our local partners work flat-out to reach vulnerable communities and prevent further loss of life. In order to respond appropriately, we take some time to consult with children and their families to find out what people really need. We start to source essential relief supplies, like water containers, food, mosquito nets, blankets and materials to build temporary shelters. We buy supplies locally wherever possible.
Full-scale relief effort
In the aftermath of an emergency, Save the Children immediately begins assessing the scale of the problem and planning how to respond. Our team of international experts often help support this process. In a large-scale emergency we might fly in specialist emergency staff, such as nutrition and logistics experts, and extra supplies and equipment that are desperately needed and cannot be bought locally.
Days after the Asian tsunami struck on 26 December 2004, we sent critical supplies on a flight to Sri Lanka, such as portable generators, satellite phones and water purification tablets. The 1.2 million water purification tablets sent provided enough clean drinking water for 37,000 families for a week.
Disasters often separate children from their parents. These vulnerable children need to be reunified with their parents or surviving relatives as soon as possible. But when communities have been torn apart and thousands of people have been displaced, this isn't as easy as it sounds. We have helped thousands of lost children find their parents.
Rebuilding lives
Even during difficult times it's important to give children a sense of normality. This can be done by providing them with temporary schools and a safe place to play.
On 27 May 2006, an earthquake struck central Java, Indonesia. It killed nearly 6,000 people and damaged 500,000 houses. Save the Children provided emergency education facilities to nearly 14,000 children by providing tents, desks and school materials and by training nearly 650 local teachers. We also gave 2,500 children 50 safe spaces - places where they could play with other children and recover from their traumatic experiences.
As the situation stabilises after an emergency, Save the Children works hard to help people rebuild their lives. Sometimes people have lost everything in a disaster. In some cases, we provide people with the money they need to restart their farms or businesses.
Poor rainfall in parts of Kenya led to a humanitarian emergency in 2005. Crops failed to grow which led to high rates of malnutrition in children and up to 75 per cent of all livestock being lost. Livestock, such as cows and goats, provide families with food and security. We provided families with cash so that they could purchase new animals best suited to their needs.
More information
How we hold ourselves accountable
Save the Children staff are bound by the principles laid out in The Code of Conduct for the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) in Disaster Relief. We are also active in a number of initiatives working to improve the quality and accountability of humanitarian assistance, including:
- The Sphere Project
The Sphere Project has developed minimum operational standards and a programme of training and reviews to support agencies as they work to implement humanitarian programmes. The Sphere handbook contains the Humanitarian Charter, and minimum standards for response in the following core areas - food security, nutrition and food aid; water, sanitation and hygiene promotion; shelter, settlement and non-food items; and health.
- HAP-I (Humanitarian Accountability Project - International)
HAP-I is a partnership of member agencies that share a commitment to making humanitarian action accountable to disaster survivors.
- ALNAP (Active Learning Network for Accountability and Performance in Humanitarian Action)
ALNAP is dedicated to improving the quality and accountability of humanitarian action, by sharing lessons; identifying common problems; and where appropriate, building consensus on approaches. ALNAP has linked humanitarian organisations to donors and the UN in actively promoting lesson learning and the sharing of best practice in humanitarian response.
- People in Aid
People in Aid has developed a voluntary code for the management and support of national and international staff during emergency response operations and also promotes the networking of staff involved in the management of human resources across the humanitarian sector.
- Emergency Capacity Building Project (ECB)
The ECB project is a collaborative effort of seven humanitarian agencies that are jointly tackling common problems in emergency response and preparedness, including staff capacity, accountability (primarily to affected populations), impact measurement, risk reduction, and the use of information and technology in emergencies.
